In 1939 there were 1,404,000 marriages of those of all ages. In 1940 among the age cohort 18 to 29 there were just over 5 million marriages.

The Selective Service Act was enacted in September 1940.

There are actually some good reasons for having a military draft, though I’m not sure this is really one of them. There are some practical problems, particularly in an age of radical feminism and no-fault divorce.

I have thought a bit about the draft from 1940 to 1973, though I didn’t know a book with that title had been written. My father and all my uncles did military service. My father and his brother were in the navy in the Pacific for World War II. My mother’s youngest brother was drafted during Vietnam and served stateside. A couple uncles were in the army reserves during that between Korea and Vietnam period when there were still some being drafted like Elvis Presley. Another uncle had a 20-year air force career.

In contrast, I have a couple dozen male cousins, and only two of us ever enlisted. It’s now been four decades since our third of a century of conscription ended, and it’s becoming easier to see the conscription era as the anomaly.